


Claudia's Family

by tellany



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: Claudia-centric, Female Friendship, Female-Centric, Gen, Mentor/Protégé, Vaguely AU, basically Helena stayed because I am incapable of not writing in bering&wells headspace, fic with images
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 12:26:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3381464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tellany/pseuds/tellany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Family, Claudia realizes, is sometimes patterns that emerge from time spent together.</p><p>One shots accompanied with graphics. Claudia-centric.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chess (Helena & Claudia)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once a week, Helena and Claudia wake up early before breakfast and come downstairs to play chess.

Once a week, every week, Helena and Claudia wake up early before breakfast and come downstairs to play chess while the rest of the team sleeps.  Claudia, they have discovered, is actually a good enough player to provide a real challenge even to Helena. Helena eventually wins most games but they rarely are easy victories.

While there are quiet periods where the focus is fully on the game, these don’t usually last throughout the whole two hours. Sometimes, Helena tells stories about her time at Warehouse 12. Other times, they discuss politics or engineering between turns. There are weeks where barely any moves are made across the chess board.

Claudia always looks forward to these mornings with Helena. Sometimes, when things are particularly brutal and hard, or when nightmares and memories are too close to the surface, they are the only time Claudia smiles all week.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beta: my little sis (who requested to be credited this way :) )
> 
> While, Helena’s mentoring style would very nurturing, and she and Claud have a great bond, i don't think she sees Claudia as a replacement to Christina, or someone to mother. Helena sees a lot of herself in Claudia, or at least the version of her that was apprentice before all the bad. So I can imagine Helena trying to be to Claudia what Caturanga was to Helena all those years ago.
> 
> Previously posted on tumblr [here](http://tellany.tumblr.com/post/105834479542/claudias-family-1-3-chess-helena-claudia)


	2. Firearms (Myka & Claudia)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first time Claudia uses an actual gun is in Somerville, Massachusetts.

The first time Claudia uses an actual gun is in Somerville, Massachusetts. Teslas aren’t working against the shielding on the giant robot. Pete is lying on the floor, knocked out by the swipe of a metal arm.

Out of ideas and tools, Claudia picks up Pete’s gun and tries to shoot at every exposed circuit she can see. It is only luck that allows Myka to reach them in time.  
  
A few days later, Myka drives Claudia to a shooting range in Rapid City. They start with things like how to assemble and disassemble a gun, and how to load and release the cartridge. These come easily to Claudia. However, when they begin the actual shooting practice, it is not long before Claudia wants to run away in embarrassment over just how bad she is at this. (In her defense, Teslas don’t have the kickback, and you only have to aim them in the general direction of the target.)  
  
After a frustrating hour, she complains to Myka how she wishes she could be as badass as her and hit the target’s head with one bullet instead of, like, taking twenty tries. The expression on Myka’s face stops Claudia mid-sentence though. “Not that we kill anyone unless there is no other option, Obi-wan. I won’t, honest!”  
  
Myka smiles sadly at that. “I hope you’ll never have to, Claud,” she says. She then resumes adjusting Claudia’s posture and grip.  
  
These training sessions become a regular thing. Every so often, Claudia accompanies Myka to the range and spends an hour trying to hit the target. Myka is a good teacher though and with time, Claudia’s aim does gradually improve.  
  
Claudia has a new addition to her nightmares: one with blood on floor, blank eyes staring at her and cold metal in her hand. That is okay though because there are worse nightmares than this, like the ones where Artie dies, or Leena or Helena or Myka or Pete… So, she never misses a practice and she never tells Myka what she dreams about.

Besides, she figures, Myka probably knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks to my anon beta for all their feedback and sticking out through 3 unexpected rewrites of this. All mistakes are obviously my own.
> 
> additional image credits: Sanctuary s01e08
> 
> At some point Claudia must have learned how to actually use guns, it would be somewhat reckless for her to not know at least basics as a field agent.
> 
> I can imagine Myka being the one who teaches her. I mean who else is going to do it? Artie is too busy being Claudia’s overprotective father figure. Pete is too busy escaping from anything serious and depressing (and teaching a 19 years old how to kill someone definitely counts as depressing). Steve came in the picture too late and Helena hates guns.
> 
> Myka wouldn’t particularly enjoy the task but being logical she would get that there is no point in sheltering Claudia. She is also the responsible one. Anyway…
> 
> Previously posted on tumblr [here](http://tellany.tumblr.com/post/107506713492/claudias-family-2-3-firearms-myka)


	3. Cooking (Leena & Claudia, Team)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One of the things Claudia misses the most about Leena is their Saturday afternoons in the kitchen.

One of the things Claudia misses the most about Leena is their Saturday afternoons in the kitchen.

Every Saturday, since the second week of her moving in to the B&B, Claudia came downstairs in late afternoon to help Leena cook the Saturday team dinner. Well, at least she tried to help: the results varied from being actually useful to getting distracted and tinkering with (improving!) kitchen appliances.

Leena is the first person Claudia has talked to about the psychiatric institution at any length. She is also the person who taught Claudia the difference between parsley and basil and their respective uses. Claudia wonders if anyone else on the team knows that Leena left a potential career as a teacher behind to work at the Warehouse, or that she had two identical twin brothers that she could tell apart despite their relentless efforts to trick her. (“their auras are very different,” she had said, laughing).

——

The first Saturday after Leena’s death, two days after the funeral and three days after they saved the world from sweating sickness, Claudia decides to cook Leena’s ravioli dish for the team.

As she walks out of the kitchen with the heavy pan, she sees the team pause at the glass doors of the dining room. Claudia knows from their stares that, for that one moment, they see a ghost in her place. Then Helena steps forward to rescue the pan from her precarious hold. Myka and Steve move to set the table in a hurry. Pete guides a still somewhat dazed Artie to the table. Within minutes everything is sorted out and they are all sitting around the table and eating.

The ravioli is too salty and Claudia burnt the bottom while trying to figure out the salad. Nobody complains though. And the initial quiet only lasts until Pete’s suggestion of having a gaming night. Claudia is not certain how that devolves into a heated discussion on consoles but soon she, Steve and Pete are arguing loudly as to which device is best. Myka shakes her head, Helena rolls her eyes, and then they pointedly ignore the rest of the table, talking quietly to each other. As Claudia loudly disagrees with Pete’s latest comment on ubiquity of Xbox, she even notices Artie crack a tiny smile.

Claudia still misses Leena terribly, and she knows that feeling might never go away. However, sitting at the table with her family, she thinks for first time in days that they might be alright, eventually.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> additional image credit: [link](https://www.flickr.com/photos/katsrcool/13769618965)
> 
> Last part of this small fic-like thing. :) This one was meant to be about Leena and Claudia only, but the rest of the team decided to crash the party. It bothers me a little that we know so little about Leena, about her outside of the Warehouse context.
> 
> Previously posted on tumblr [here](http://tellany.tumblr.com/post/111130544012/claudias-family-see-all-3-3-cooking-leena)


End file.
